Foolish things of the world

https://odb.org/2024/06/21/finding-rest-3

When I was younger, it didn’t really turn my eye when my senior pastor then pursued a Masters degree in Misiology from Fuller Seminary. He was a career minister as he went to bible school first before starting the Latter Rain Church of Malaysia (“LRC”). What was ironic, though, was that the bunch of full-time pastors then serving God in the church did not have any seminary education. They were mostly graduates from University Malaya as LRC’s home base, known as Miracle Villa, was just a 10 mins walk away from the campus grounds. More ironic that a number of them only went to bible school after they left LRC.

Thus, I grew up in a church with mostly very fervent pastors without seminary qualifications whose teachings and practices mirror those of the church. You could say that God was using the foolish things of the world to confound the wise like Paul’s statement in 1 Corinthians 1: 27, except that these were mostly graduates of the most prestigious university in the country. In other words, they were smart pastors, just not theologically trained. But the founding and senior pastor was from seminary background, and thus, the tenets of the faith of the church were intact. Just that in some areas, the interpretation might have been narrower than mainstream. For example, a belief that the church should comprise 80% core and 20% peripheral, which is visionary but idealistic in the real world.

The thing that stuck with me all these years is that you don’t really need a seminary education to serve God in a meaningful way, but to be a pastor I am realistic enough to accept that a basic seminary education is necessary. Sadly, I noticed that nowadays, in the church world, people are actually pursuing and even trumpeting academic qualifications and titles as a form of respectability and acceptance among their peers. Prestigious theology degrees are thus more sought after and respected compared to divinity or ministry qualifications, perhaps as it opens up a new career line in academia. It’s just that in pursuing qualifications after qualifications, the church has become more like the world in needing acceptance, recognition, and respectability of men than God. I can not but say that it is a really strange phenomenon as Christ only chose one Paul among the other 11 Apostles.

What’s the lesson for us? I believe in all things we should only boast in Christ, that it is in Christ alone that we find our glory. In every victory, let it be said that our source of strength and source of hope is Christ alone and nothing else. Acceptance of who we are and recognition of our ministry should lie with God and Christ and no one else. We do not need a doctorate from a prestigious seminary to tell the world that we have arrived in the church world. It could well dilute our branding before God and Christ!